For avid book readers

[jbcohen]

Hi, I am addicted to litterature and my mrs. My family at home will quite often find me at home, 98% of the time, with my nose in a novel or two and most of the time with my nose in my chosen electronic book reader. As such I am a heavy book reader and as such I have to confront two problems that I would like to ask what have others of us book adicts done to contront these problems:

1) How to feed my adiction without breaking the bank, I am afraid of emptying the bank account buying them.

2) How to acquire enough books to feed my adiction.

Thus far here is what I have come up with:

1) Harlaquine has a business unit called Global Library where they run a readers service where they send you books on a bi-weekly basis typically $4 per book.

2) Been buying books lately in bundles from BAEN, in their month bundles typically comes out to $3 per book.

What have you done to confront the twin challenges.

[tecweston]

1) How to feed my adiction without breaking the bank, I am afraid of emptying the bank account buying them.

Library.

2) How to acquire enough books to feed my adiction.

Library.

What have you done to confront the twin challenges.

Library.

[ATDrake]

1) & 2) Library, pick up pretty much all the official publisher-promo freebies in case I might want to give one of them a try, wait for deep-discount sale and stock up on books of the type that I typically read and the blurb/sample looks interesting/reads well.

But really, it's mainly the library.

PS. If you like sleuthy-to-thriller mysteries and haven't already seen this, Poisoned Pen Press has an excellent Build Your Library introductory sale deal with currently 23 of their start-of-series books, DRM-free in a Mobi/ePub bundle when bought directly from them, for only 99 cents each.

I've bought the lot (last year's offerings and this month's additions) and enjoyed 6 out of 10 read so far enough to recommend, and the other 4 were decent enough reads.

[theenframed]

I check the Deals, Freebies forum here on Mobileread. ATDrake posts a daily Amazon KDP pile with plenty of limited-time freebies in a mixture of genres. During the past month or so, I have accumulated over 700 titles. I am not sure of their quality, as I have not yet read any. I will probably end up deleting many of them in the future, but I am also sure that I will find some gems amongst the rough. Check out other posts in that forum too for freebies.

I believe this will be enough to feed your dual addiction

[HomeInMyShoes]

Library. Amazon's monthly 100 book sale (I pick up on average one a month from it). Word of mouth on other sales and then just stalking my wishlist. I only give myself a very limited book allowance to purchase books (either electronic or paper) and have to make due with the library, scouring sales and reading some public domain classics to keep on track. That said, I've never been at a loss for good things to read and have managed to scrounge enough money to have a few months banked allowance to purchase books. Setting an allowance really got me focused on finding good books on the cheap and on using my library more.

[carpetmojo]

You are NOT addicted, and certainly not avid - you're just in real trouble

A recent survey (disclosed in a thread here) reckoned "avid" was 10 books a year !

That makes the majority of us stark raving loopy - but you must be a very sad case indeed....

[AnemicOak]

Originally Posted by jbcohen

1) How to feed my adiction without breaking the bank, I am afraid of emptying the bank account buying them.

2) How to acquire enough books to feed my adiction.

Mix in Public Domain books, books from the library (if that's an option) and from the various bargains, sales & freebies which take place all of the time. Check out the Baen CD's at the Fifth Imperium if you haven't already.

[The Terminator]

I get books from the online Library, and while the book is on hold I'll just read something else.

Yeah that study that "Avid" is 10 books a year is really funny, I've almost read that already.

[tecweston]

Originally Posted by The Terminator

I get books from the online Library, and while the book is on hold I'll just read something else.

Yeah that study that "Avid" is 10 books a year is really funny, I've almost read that already.

Right. 10 books a year is a casual reader. At that rate you're reading less than a book a month, and unless each book is 1000+ pages that's not very much reading.

[HomeInMyShoes]

Originally Posted by The Terminator

I get books from the online Library, and while the book is on hold I'll just read something else.

Yeah that study that "Avid" is 10 books a year is really funny, I've almost read that already.

Lol. I can quit now and keep my membership open.

I've always defined myself as an avid reader. Even when I only read about fifteen to twenty books a year. At many points in my life, it can be difficult to get in more than a half hour of reading a day, so I'll grant anyone over 12 as pretty dedicated. It's more a function of wanting to read and usually having a book on the go that would define an avid reader for me.

Right now, I'd classify myself in the mentally unstable reader category.

[The Terminator]

I forgot to mention in my previous post that while I used to get a lot of books from the online Library the selection is going down, so I have to buy more and more books.

You should see the books that they are adding right now, complete crap most of it.

[LuvReadin]

Originally Posted by AnemicOak

Mix in Public Domain books

A vote for this as well - the last stats I saw reckoned there were 15 million PD books out there; there must be something you'd like!

[HomeInMyShoes]

Originally Posted by The Terminator

I read a little over 1600 pages last month so I think I'm in the "Avid" category.


I forgot to mention in my previous post that while I used to get a lot of books from the online Library the selection is going down, so I have to buy more and more books.

You should see the books that they are adding right now, complete crap most of it.

Lol on the crap part. If you look at what I've read this year, over half is paper (7 to 6 right now). Some stuff I want to read just isn't available in e-book format and with a Kindle in Canada I can't automagically borrow e-books from my library anyway. Budget and availabiltiy are two reasons that my e-reader will not become my only method of reading in the near future.

[JeremyR]

The downloads section here. Crutledge usually uploads a book a day.

Not to mention other free book places, like Munsys

[The Terminator]

Originally Posted by JeremyR

The downloads section here. Crutledge usually uploads a book a day.

Not to mention other free book places, like Munsys

A lot of good books are here, but most are out of copyright. You need a break from the classics once in awhile.